


Whoops

by Honey_Lavender



Series: The Future Is Bright [3]
Category: SKAM (Norway)
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2020-11-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:49:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27799516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Honey_Lavender/pseuds/Honey_Lavender
Summary: She tossed out forgotten takeout containers, half a tub of yoghurt, and some alarmingly fuzzy blueberries, then stopped to consider some orange juice that she couldn’t remember buying. She opened it up and took a whiff to confirm that it had gone bad-ugh, definitely yes- then caught sight of something that made her gasp and drop the carton.It tipped over to one side, and juice chugged steadily onto the floor as she stared at the NuvaRing sitting at the back of the fridge. As if that was where it was supposed to be. Instead ofinside her.This is how Noora and WIlliam started their family (and found the one they already had along the way).
Relationships: Eva Kviig Mohn/Christoffer Schistad, Minor or Background Relationship(s), William Magnusson/Noora Amalie Sætre
Series: The Future Is Bright [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/801183
Comments: 5
Kudos: 38





	Whoops

**Author's Note:**

> CW for a very brief discussion of body image issues and recovery from eating disorders. If you'd rather not read, you can skip from "She was also surprised at how happy it made her" to "The creak of the door".

Noora sighed and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand and stared into the cluttered mess that was the middle shelf of their fridge.

It was Saturday morning, she and William had been living in their new place for about three months, and the refrigerator desperately needed cleaning.

She’d thought that it being just the two of them would make for a neater arrangement than what they’d shared with Linn and Eskild at the kollektivet, but she’d gotten so used to buying food under the assumption that a significant part of it would be stolen that she didn’t know how to properly estimate what she and WIlliam actually ate. Which led to waste, which she hated, but better to confront it now than let it take over the rest of the kitchen.

She tossed out forgotten takeout containers, half a tub of yoghurt, and some alarmingly fuzzy blueberries, then stopped to consider some orange juice that she couldn’t remember buying. She opened it up and took a whiff to confirm that it had gone bad- _ugh, definitely yes_ \- then caught sight of something that made her gasp and drop the carton.

It tipped over to one side, and juice chugged steadily onto the floor as she stared at the NuvaRing sitting at the back of the fridge. As if that was where it was supposed to be. Instead of _inside her_.

“Noora? What-” William yelped when his socked foot made contact with the puddle that had spread to about two feet in diameter at that point.

“William.” Her voice was much calmer than it had any right to be, considering that she was screaming internally. “Did you move this?”

“I dunno, maybe?” he answered distractedly; his attention was so focused on laying paper towels on the floor and peeling off his sticky sock that he’d barely looked up to see what she was holding.

Her mind was racing, trying to figure out how this could have happened. She always stayed on top of these things, what had she been doing a month ago that made her forget something so important?

And then it hit her. This time last month, she had been on the last day of her period at a particularly rowdy club with the girls; one of their more ill-fated reunion get-togethers. Her phone had gotten smashed on the dance floor, and poor Vilde had ended up in the ER with a broken nose from a stray elbow. That hospital visit had lasted into the wee hours of the next morning, and by the time Noora got home it was all she could do to shed her outer layers and crawl into bed. Her phone was replaced eventually, but the alarm she set to remind herself to insert her birth control had vanished with her old device, which led her to the present. Questioning every single one of her life choices and belatedly registering a hand waving in front of her face.

“Hello?”

The smile on William's face faded as he took in her stricken expression. “What is it?”

Noora closed her hand around the ring and slipped it into her pocket.

“Sorry, nothing. I just...I forgot to buy something.” She slipped past him, grabbed her purse, pulled on a pair of boots, then walked out the door before he could react.

She knew she wasn’t acting anywhere approaching normal, but this was as close as she could get at the moment. The only thing that was keeping her from a full-blown panic attack was focusing on the very next thing that she had to do. _Walk down the street. Go to the convenience store. Find the pregnancy tests._

She gave a brittle smile to the cashier, a middle-aged lady, when she rang up her order. The woman returned it with a knowing look, but Noora was too frazzled to tell if it was meant to be understanding or judgmental.

And then she was outside again, taking lungfuls of brisk morning air. Every step back felt heavier than the next. How could she have been so careless? 

She’d only just gotten into the swing of things at her job at the paper, and William wasn’t finishing law school until next year. They had just started talking about the wedding again, after tabling it for the last year in favor of saving up for a two-room flat instead. It had seemed like everything was about to get easier, and that they’d finally be able to take a breath. But now everything was up in the air again.

The possibility of her- _their_ carefully planned future unraveling so quickly tied her stomach in knots and sent her head spinning, and she had to lean against the side of a wall for a minute to steady herself.

After a few deep breaths, Noora swallowed and looked up to see William a block away, sitting on the steps of their apartment building with her coat laid across his lap. She realized distantly that she'd forgotten it, and that her fingers were in fact going numb from the cold.

He was on his feet as soon as she came into view, and then he was bundling her up and hustling her inside.

“Where did you go? You didn't even take your phone.” He looked at her, equal parts reproachful and worried.

“Just around the corner.” 

The smallness of her voice made worry win out. He took her face in his hands and looked at her like he was trying to read her mind. Sometimes it felt like he could. She wondered for a fleeting moment what it might be like to see such serious brown eyes on a toddler, but snapped out of it when he spoke.

“What's wrong?” His thumb skimmed her cheekbone and she leaned into it. She didn't really trust herself to get the words out, so instead she held up the plastic bag from the convenience store for him to take.

“It might be nothing,” she said as he pulled the box out, and she wasn't sure who she was trying to convince.

His eyebrows rose but the set line of his mouth softened a little. His eyes roved over the packaging, like he was trying to memorize everything printed on it. Finally he put it back in her hand.

“Results in three minutes.” He reached past her to unlock their door, and they shuffled wordlessly inside. They shed their layers in silence as well, neither knowing what to say. There wasn't much point in talking until they knew one way or the other, she supposed. She went ahead to the bathroom and let him in once the test had been capped and her phone’s timer had been set. Even as she watched the seconds tick by time seemed to slow down. She jogged her leg anxiously from her perch on the rim of the tub until William's hand came down on it, warm and steadying. He squeezed it and she managed a watery smile.

After an eternity, her phone shrieked and she jumped a little, fumbling to turn it off. Her heart fluttered somewhere around her throat, and she found that her hands were shaking too badly to hold it, so she handed it over to William. 

He stared at it for awhile, then looked up at her, his expression carefully blank.

“You’re pregnant, Noora.”

The tears she’d been holding in burst out of her. He stood and pulled her head to his chest, and she buried her face in his shirt.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Why?”

“I fucked up my birth control and now-”

“Do you want it?” The tightness in his voice made her tilt her head up so she could see him. He knelt down to make up the difference and they were eye-level again.

She was afraid to say _yes, of course_ , because she knew it would be irresponsible. Selfish. 

“We're not ready.”

He saw through her, like he always did. “That’s not what I asked.”

“I don’t know. Maybe? But we don’t have money, you haven’t even finished school-”

“I’ll pick up more shifts at work.” 

“This apartment isn’t big enough for three-”

“We can clear out the office.”

“The wedding?” This last one was feeble. They both knew that they would have eloped by now if their friends wouldn’t have strangled them for it.

“We’ll move it up. Not like we wanted some big event to begin with.” He took her hands, which had thankfully stopped trembling, and pressed his mouth to the knuckles, then pulled back to look at her again. “If people waited until they were completely ready for children no one would have them. And we can't possibly do worse than our parents.”

She hiccupped and wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “How are you so sure?”

“Because it’s us,” he said simply. “I love you, and you love me, so we’ll work it out.”

“So...we’re having a baby?” She laughed when she said it; it sounded so strange coming out of her mouth.

“We’re having a baby,” he repeated, and his smile was like the first rays of sun after a storm. Noora slid off the tub and kissed him hard enough for him to fall backward, and as they lay laughing and tangled together on the bathroom floor she let herself hope that he was right. They would work everything out together.

-

In the days that followed, they spent any time not working or studying holed up in their apartment, researching and making doctor’s appointments and decorating their tiny tree. They even opted out of their traditional Kollektivet Christmas in favor of their own private holiday.

“Let’s have Christmas with just the two of us,” she’d said. Our first and last, she'd thought.

They had agreed not to exchange gifts that year, so there was nothing to pull them out of bed but food and bathroom breaks. When William was gone for a particularly long time Noora scrolled through her phone to answer some holiday wishes from the girls, and eventually came to one from Chris.

**From: Christoffer  
MON 11:13  
Merry Christmas! Congrats btw**

She typed out a quick thanks as her heart sank, and when William reentered he raised an eyebrow at her sitting hunched up with her phone.

“Everything okay?”

“Did you tell Chris?”

He paused, holding the quilt in midair but not climbing in. “...Was I not supposed to?”

“We shouldn’t say anything yet, not til at least twelve weeks. I could miscarry and then everyone would-” She saw him blanch and trailed off. It wasn’t something she really wanted to think about either. Even after only a few weeks of knowing, the thought of losing this piece of them growing inside her was close to unbearable.

He slid back into bed and wrapped his arms around her waist. She flinched at the cold of his hands on her skin, but they warmed up quickly enough.

“I’ll make sure he doesn’t tell anyone else,” he promised, effectively ending the conversation. They left the rest unsaid, but it was a conscious decision for both of them. No need to hash out fears that might not come true and couldn’t be stopped if they did. So instead they held onto each other, watching the sun set over the surrounding rooftops until the snow drifting by their window lulled them to sleep.

\--

William eased the door to their apartment shut behind him, willing it not to creak. He was moderately successful, with only a small squeak as he turned the knob that he hoped wasn’t enough to wake his sleeping fiancee.

They’d both been thankful that so far Noora hadn’t had any morning sickness, but it seemed that the tradeoff for this was that she’d become borderline narcoleptic. If she sat down for more than ten minutes on any reasonably comfortable surface she was out like a light, but somehow she still looked tired all the time. Which was why he refused when she suggested she get a second job and instead asked his boss for more hours to ease her growing anxiety about their finances.

He didn’t mind really. William had realized very early on that while he didn’t exactly enjoy being poor (in fact he disliked it pretty strongly), there were some benefits to being cut off. It gave him a new appreciation for service industry workers now that he was one, and solidified his conviction that the career path he was on was the one he wanted. As an added bonus, he no longer had to deal with the conflicted resentment he’d felt toward his mother and father for all but abandoning him in Oslo and leaving an endless cashflow as their replacement, which probably added years to his life in avoided liver damage alone.

But that being said, he was still coming home from four hours of class and eight hours of work, and he absolutely had to finish a paper tonight before he could even think about sleeping.

He had just fumbled at the laces of his boots enough to step out of them when he heard a yawn from the living room couch.

“Hi.” Noora's blonde hair emerged from a nest of blankets that fell away as she sat up and stretched. 

“Hi.” The sight of her sleepy face was already draining some of the pressure that had been building up behind his eyes and threatening to become a headache. He hurried to hang his coat and go over to get his welcome home kiss.

“There's food on the stove,” she mumbled against the corner of his mouth.

He retrieved a bowl of stew that had been simmering in the kitchen and Noora moved her blanket mountain to one cushion so he could sit with her. 

“Smells good,” he said, and she gave a wan smile. She seemed a bit off, but he refrained from commenting on it. He ate quietly, and she rested her cheek on his shoulder.

“I heard from my mom today.”

Ah. There it was. Correspondence with Noora’s parents was always a bit frustrating. 

She never argued with them, but they were notoriously flaky if she wanted anything more from them than their usual monthly phone call. In fact, William had only met them once, when they turned up to celebrate Noora’s graduation from university, three hours after the event had taken place. William’s skepticism that Noora’s parents could be anything but delighted with her was replaced with quietly disgusted outrage ever since.

Nevertheless, she’d been trying to get ahold of them and see if they could make it to the wedding with limited success. After a handful of missed phone calls she had given up on etiquette and texted them the date last week.

He set his bowl on the coffee table in front of them. “Did they get the invitation?”

“Mm-hm.”

“And?” He brushed a piece of hair behind her ear and gazed at her intently.

“She said congratulations, but they’re going on a cruise that month and they can’t get their deposit back now if they cancel, so they’d send a gift.” She shrugged, and the hurt in her eyes made his blood boil in a way that he hadn’t felt in a long time.

He opened his mouth to say that that was bullshit, and fuck them for being so self-absorbed, but she wasn’t finished.

“I told them not to bother. And to enjoy their vacation and call when they actually want to be a part of our lives, and maybe we’d consider letting them be part of their grandchild’s.”

He was glad to be sitting because the rush of pride he felt most likely would have knocked him off his feet. “Good,” he said.

She studied the quilt spread over her lap and picked at a loose thread. It was old, one he’d seen in Noora’s room since they’d first started dating. He wondered idly where she’d gotten it from.

“I just...after last week it feels more real. You know?”

They had gone for their first sonogram after the new year, and the experience had affected both of them more than they’d expected. Noora had held his hand in a white-knuckled grip the entire time, and didn't relax until they heard the whooshing sound of their baby’s heartbeat over the monitor. It had set his own heart fluttering with the realization that they were going to be someone's mom and dad, a real living person that they had made together. They hadn't really discussed it since, but the responsibility of it all must have been weighing on her too. 

William hummed in agreement, a tacit encouragement for her to go on.

“I've gotten so used to how they are, but I don’t want the baby to ever feel the way they made me feel growing up. Even if that means not having them around.”

He shrugged. “I think Linn and Eskild will be happy to take over.”

That must have been the right thing to say, because she snorted and her shoulders shook with suppressed laughter.

“Grandma Linn. Grandpa Eskild,” she giggled.

William assumed the discussion was over, but when he went to take his bowl back off the table, Noora’s face turned serious again.

“Speaking of family,” she said, and he tried not to grimace. He knew where this was going. “Is anyone from your side coming?”

Noora hadn’t pressed the issue when they’d sent out initial invitations, taking him at his word that he would handle his end of the guest list and report back when he had his RSVPs. But now that the date was coming up William supposed there was no use avoiding it any longer. He knew she felt badly about his falling-out with his father, partially responsible, even, so maybe she had hoped this would be a chance for them to reconnect.

But what Noora didn’t know was that no amount of time or good will would change his father’s mind about William since he’d rejected the dazzling life of a London stockbroker. He had known that cutting ties with him was a permanent decision, and he’d made peace with it before he’d even moved into the kollektivet.

“I don’t want them there. Any of them.” He said it matter-of-factly, and took a bite of the cooling stew. “Let's just invite the people who actually make our lives better.” 

Noora smiled, and it finally reached her eyes. “Sounds good to me.”

\--

“So I was wondering if you’d want candles or plants or maybe something edible. What do you think?”

“Hm?” Noora jumped and felt a pang of guilt for nodding off into her soup while Vilde essentially planned her fast-approaching wedding for her over lunch breaks. She had turned out to be a godsend, jumping into every aspect of the logistics with a zeal that Noora couldn’t have hoped to keep up with, were it all left up to her. “Sorry, what?”

“Your favors.” Vilde’s brow furrowed and she tilted her head to one side, blonde hair sweeping over her shoulder. “Are you okay? You seem a little run-down.”

She was, honestly. She’d been chasing a few stories outside of her regular assignments, and long days had turned into long nights at the office to meet her deadlines. 

On top of that, she couldn’t shake the fear that the stress and overworking was hurting the baby, that she was already failing as a mother, and she really wanted to talk to someone who wasn’t William about it. But she just couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud yet, even though it rushed to the front of her mind every time she was with friends.

“I’m just tired. Work has been busier lately, and there’s just so much more to this than I thought there would be.” Noora smiled to reassure her. “But you’re being so helpful. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Vilde nodded sympathetically. “Don’t worry about it. I think I’m only enjoying it because it’s not actually for me. I’ll probably be too stressed to do my own.” She grinned. “But I do have the color scheme picked out. And the theme. And I have some venues in mind...” 

Noora laughed, and they spent the next few minutes imagining Vilde’s dream wedding before getting back to Noora’s real one.

-

The wedding was mostly a blur, a rush of rehearsing and making sure everything was running smoothly and having to pee every twenty goddamn minutes. But in the end it was all worth it, and it was hard for Noora to catch her breath when she thought about how she and William were surrounded by so many people who cared about them when just a few years ago they had both been convinced that they would never get to have something like this. The joy was overwhelming. After saying the promises that they had made to each other years ago out loud, for everyone to hear, she floated through the rest of the day, stopping at tables to accept congratulations and thank everyone for coming. William hovered at first, on the lookout for signs of fatigue, but eventually he relaxed enough to let her out of his sight and mingle separately.

In that time Noora successfully weaseled her way out of taking shots with Eskild, chatted with Mari, and took a rare moment alone to look out at the crowd on the dance floor. She smiled when she caught sight of Chris twirling Eva exaggeratedly, then pretending to have the wind knocked out of him when she spun back into his chest. 

She was cautiously pleased to see the two of them getting along so well. She'd always had an exasperated sort of fondness for Chris, and though she couldn’t say without a doubt that he’d turned over a new leaf, she’d observed a distinct decline in the amount of times she’d walked in on him in any compromising positions over the last few years. It didn’t sound like much, but for Chris that was a pretty significant improvement.

As for Eva, she'd been single for about ten months now, and while Noora would never want her to rush into a relationship for its own sake, from what she could see Eva had done nothing but smile and laugh with him all weekend. So when the maid of honor and best man went missing ten minutes later, all she could do was laugh with the rest of the bridal party and ask Sana to give them five more minutes before she headed off to retrieve them.

After that it felt like everything was going by at double speed. One second she was throwing her bouquet, and the next second she was waving goodbye out the passenger-side window of their car as they made their way to their hotel.

It wasn’t a long drive, but Noora felt the day catching up with her as she leaned her head against the window, and the next thing she knew she was being tucked into a warm, soft bed. She held on long enough to feel the brush of lips on her forehead, then slipped back into sleep.

-

Sunlight streamed over Noora’s face and made her brow furrow, but she didn’t open her eyes. Not yet. She listened to the rustle of sheets and smelled warm, clean skin as it pressed up against her. Still she held on, not cracking an eye open until something tickled her cheek, then her brow.

“Hi,” William said. His face was mere inches from hers, but a tiny feather between them was obscuring her view.

“Hi.” He grinned when she tried to pluck the feather from between his fingers, but before she could reach he had tucked it back into his pillowcase. 

She accepted a kiss from him, then yawned, “What time is it?”

William checked his phone and, after furrowing his brows for a moment, sighed, set it back down on the bedside table, and laid back to stare blankly at the ceiling.

“What? Is it that late?”

He handed her his phone so she could read the text on his homescreen.

**From: Chris  
SUN 7:14  
Eva’s giving me another shot!!😎😎  
Oh and she knows about Noora, sorry bro 😣**

“Well, that was...two hours ago, so I think everyone knows by now.” She took her own phone from the side table and saw that she had 54 unread messages, all from the girls’ group chat.

“One day.” He slid his hand down over his face. “He was with her _one day_.”

Noora chuckled. “You know how they are.”

He turned to look at her. “I thought you’d be more upset.”

“I’m thirteen weeks now, so we're more or less in the clear.”

“Really?” He sat up. “That was quick.”

“Only twenty-six to go.”

“Then I guess we'd better make the most of it, huh?”

She tapped her chin thoughtfully, trying not to smile. “Any ideas on what to do first?”

“Just one.” He pulled the sheet up over their heads and pulled her down with him, laughing as they went. 

\--

“Aaand there’s your baby,” the doctor cooed at the blurry image on the screen. “It’s about the time that we can find out the sex, did you want to know?”

Just as William answered “Yes,” Noora said “No.” 

She looked at him curiously. “You want to?”

“You don’t?”

She shrugged from her reclined position on the examination table. “It doesn’t make a difference to me. It's just easier not to know. I don’t want everybody to give us gifts that are all one color or those weird onesies that say “ladies man” or “future trophy wife.”

He snorted. “Do you really think our friends are the kind of people who’d do that?”

“Maybe not,” she conceded. “But I’d still prefer if everything was gender-neutral.”

“We can do that.”

The technician looked at them expectantly and William felt a spike of anxiety. If he let this chance go he’d have to wait until the next checkup, which was weeks away. “How about we find out but keep it a secret from everyone else then?”

Noora’s expression shifted from curious to amused. “You really want to know that badly?”

“ _Yes_.” It came out more desperate than he’d intended, but he had been looking forward to knowing more about the baby, something that would make him feel more connected to them. He knew the symptoms and side effects weren’t exactly pleasant for Noora, but he did sometimes envy her for being able to experience everything as it happened. And if he wasn’t going to be able to feel any kicks for another month, this was the next best thing.

Noora seemed to understand, because she softened and took his hand. 

“Okay.” 

They turned to look at the doctor, who brightened when they made their decision. “Great! Now let’s see…” She leaned in for a moment, then grinned and faced them. “Congratulations. It looks like you’re having…”

-

“A girl? You’re having a girl?!” Chris slapped a hand on the bar and whooped, much to William’s chagrin.

“Yes, but-”

“Holy shit, a girl.” He laughed and shook his head. “You’re so fucked.”

“Noora wants to keep it a secret,” William stressed. “So if you tell anyone, and by anyone I mean Eva, and Noora finds out, we’ll make Eskild her godfather.”

Chris looked like he’d been slapped. “You wouldn’t fucking dare.”

“I'm serious.”

“Bro,” he groaned. “How am I going to keep this from her for _five months_? You shouldn’t have told me.”

“It’s really not that hard to just say nothing.”

“Not with her! She just...gets things out of me. I don’t know how she does it.” He got a faraway look in his eye, and William sighed as he settled in for his best friend waxing poetic about his wife’s best friend. Which was...weird, because at this point he thought of her the way he would a sister or a cousin, and he wouldn’t have volunteered to hear about the finer points of his cousin’s romantic escapades. But he supposed that was just the price he had to pay for having such a tight-knit group of people in his life. Not the worst thing to have, all things considered.

“I think it's actually going to work out this time. It feels different now. Better. You know?”

“Mm-hm.”

“I just can't take any relationship advice from you this time.”

“Me? What did I do?”

Chris pointed the neck of his bottle at him accusingly. “You told me if I didn’t fall in love at first sight it wasn’t real love. What kind of shitty logic was that?”

William shrugged. “You’re the one who believed me.”

“Yeah, and I fucked everything up because of it.”

He raised an eyebrow at Chris. “Do you really think you’d still be with Eva now if you’d made it official back then? Maybe everything worked out exactly the way it was supposed to because of my shitty logic. Ever think of it that way?”

Chris held up a finger and opened his mouth to retort, then stopped. His face took on a thoughtful expression as he considered the proposition and William smirked.

“You’re welcome.”

Chris rolled his eyes. “You’re obnoxious.”

They clinked bottles and sat in companionable silence. It was kind of hard to believe, he reflected, how far they’d come since Nissen. And that out of all of the things that had changed in their lives, the two of them sitting around and talking shit was the one thing that hadn’t. It was absurdly comforting. 

“You really are fucked though.”

He met Chris’s sidelong glance. “Why? Because I'll have to make sure she doesn't date guys like you?”

Chris _tsked_. “First of all, I hope you mean guys like _us_ , since I definitely wasn’t riding around in that Russ bus by myself back then. Secondly, I mean you're fucked because if she's anything like Noora you won’t stand a chance. You’ll spoil her for sure.”

He knew he should try to defend himself, deny it, but suddenly all he could think of was a little girl with half Noora’s attitude, asking-no, _demanding_ anything from him, and he knew Chris was right.

“Shit,” he said, but he couldn’t keep the grin off his face.

Chris sighed and clapped him on the shoulder. “Hopeless,” he said, but William could see that he was smiling too.

\--

“Are you ready?” William called from the living room.

Noora was not ready. In fact, she was still in her bra and underwear, staring at her newly-rounded profile in the mirror. She’d lost track of how long she’d been standing there, caught by surprise at how suddenly her baby bump had appeared. It seemed as if it had happened overnight, but now that it was here it was undeniable, poking out under her shirts like the papaya it was apparently the same size as. 

She was also surprised at how happy it made her, considering that only a few years ago the thought of looking like this would have horrified her. Even after she had regained some semblance of control over her life, broken out of the endless restriction, binging, and purging that had ruled her early teens, Noora’s relationship with her body had remained...strained. She’d recovered in part by learning to cook, and felt a distant sort of satisfaction when she made a well-balanced meal for herself, but she still only ate out of necessity. At the time it was easier for her to treat her body like a machine, as if it was something that simply needed to be maintained in order to work properly.

But now, knowing that her baby was growing inside her, was healthy, that her body was strong enough to make that happen...It felt as if she finally had permission to love herself, instead of just tolerating her weaknesses and satisfying her needs. When she looked at herself now, all she could feel was an overwhelming sense of love and warmth and excitement. She ran a hand over the bump and smiled when she felt an answering flutter from inside.

The creak of the door startled her out of her reverie.

“Everything okay?” William asked. He stepped into the room, eyes landing where her hands lay over her belly.

“Mm-hm.”

“If we don't leave by 7 we'll be late,” he said. In spite of this, he went to stand beside her, effectively blocking her from their closet and dresser. He watched his hand trace over the top of hers in the mirror, then took its place as she reached to pull him in for a kiss. After a particularly hard kick he pulled back with a gasp, eyes wide.

“Did you feel?”

“Yes,” he breathed. He reached out again and was rewarded with another sharp jab against his fingertips.

“We're going to be late,” she reminded him as his mouth ran over the join of her neck and shoulder.

“Fuck it,” he mumbled, and she laughed. She hadn’t felt like going out anyway.

\--

The day had started just like many others. William had gotten up, careful not to disturb Noora’s uneasy sleep. She’d been getting more uncomfortable at night lately, tossing and turning to find a position she could stand for more than a few minutes with limited success, so any actual rest was precious enough to have him tiptoeing over the floors and wincing at every creak. Nevertheless, he’d managed a good hour of silence before Noora shuffled out of the bedroom.

“Hungry?” he asked, already up from the couch and heading for the kitchen. “There’s eggs, or I could make toast-”

“It’s okay,” she sighed, pressing the small of her back with the heel of her hand. “I’ll just have cereal.”

“You’re sore. You should sit down.”

“I just got up,” she said waspishly. “I can be on my feet long enough to pour a bowl of cereal.”

He watched her open the cupboard, and realized at the same time that she did that she wouldn’t be able to reach. Of course normally she would have, but with her belly in the way she could only get close enough for her fingertips to brush the edge of the box.

She exhaled heavily and closed her eyes, irritation coming off her in waves, then turned on her heel toward the hall closet.

“Noora.”

“I’m getting the stool!”

“I can just-” William went over and plucked the box from the shelf, which was apparently the wrong thing to do. He tried not to laugh at the sight of Noora waddling furiously toward him like an enraged duck, but it was too cute.

Unfortunately this only made her angrier, and when she yanked the box from his hand it flew out of his lax grip and onto the floor, where the entire contents ended up spilling out. 

There was a moment of deathly silence. William looked at Noora, and she mumbled, only barely audible,

“Get out.”

The words smacked into him like a bucket of ice water.

“What?”

“Get. Out. Of the kitchen.” She pointed a trembling finger toward the living room, then seemed to change her mind and pointed to the front door. “Actually, get out of the house. You've just been hovering over me all day, _every day_ , and I feel like I'm suffocating, so please just _go away_.”

“Noora-”

“Out!”

And that was how William Magnusson, 25, almost-lawyer, husband and expectant father found himself homeless on a beautiful Sunday in May. He sat on a bus stop bench, feeling like a lost child in a supermarket. It was all he could do not to run back into the apartment and insist that they talk this out like rational adults, but he knew that would get him nothing but more trouble, so he tried to think of a plan B. Who could he ask to check on Noora who could make her feel better and argue his case well enough to convince her to let him back into the apartment?

Chris was right out; he was definitely in William’s corner but Noora’s patience for him was limited on the best of days. Eva would cheer her up but was more likely to take Noora’s side out of blind loyalty. Chris Berg was traveling, Vilde wasn’t someone he’d ask a favor from even if they were on more cordial terms now, so that left Sana. 

He allowed himself to hope. Sana was reasonable, and despite her foreboding energy he suspected she actually kind of liked him, for which he was eternally grateful.

“Yes?” Her voice was clipped when she picked up the phone, almost impatient, but he let out a sigh of relief to hear it.

“I need a favor.”

-

When Sana opened the door she gave William a long, assessing look. She then proceeded to sigh at whatever she'd seen and said, "Well come in."

He followed her into the kitchen, where they found Yousef in an apron chopping vegetables.

"I'm going out for a while," she informed him, to which he nodded, then turned back to William. "You sit down, and _don’t do anything_. I'll call you when you can come back." She wasted no time, grabbing her bag and giving Yousef's arm an affectionate squeeze before she was out the door.

William sat with the distinct feeling that Sana would know if he didn’t follow her directions exactly and watched Yousef set the knife and cutting board in the sink. If he was bothered by William’s abrupt intrusion he hid it well, wiping his hands on a towel and producing a plate of biscuits seemingly out of thin air.

"Tea?' he offered. 

William nodded, equal parts guilty and grateful. He knew that _he_ wouldn’t be able to show half the amount of hospitality with twice the time to prepare, but looking around, it was clear that Sana’s parents’ place had a warmth and openness and safety that he assumed was what people meant when they said somewhere was homey. Which wasn’t to say that the kollektivet or his and Noora’s apartment didn’t feel like home to him, but there was a sort of solidness here, the kind of security that one only felt as a child, if they were lucky.

He received the mug with a mumbled thanks and it sat untouched on the table, chamomile-scented steam rising toward his downturned face. His phone lay beside it, mocking him with every moment that it didn’t light up. He felt paralyzed, unmoored by his own lack of certainty on what to do next.

He knew Noora. He knew that she was kind and loyal and smart, but she hated not having control, and that when she felt it slipping she pushed everyone out, including him. But it had been a long time since she’d felt the need to put walls up between them, and even longer since he’d forced past them. He’d been trying so hard to make her feel safe enough to say how she felt, to really listen once she had. He couldn’t help but feel like he’d done something to make them regress, that he hadn’t been paying enough attention, that he was going to _fuck this up_ and _lose her_.

That feeling grasped at him like hands around his throat. It turned the whispered doubts in his mind to shouts; that even if his intentions were good he was still just a violent, selfish boy who never deserved the good things he’d gotten in life anyway, so didn’t it make sense that eventually he’d have to give them up again?

His knuckles turned white with how hard he dug his nails into his palm, but he stopped at the feeling of a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and was surprised to see that Yousef was now sitting beside him.

“I hear it’s normal.”

“What?” 

“The mood swings.” He shrugged with a sheepish sort of smile. “Before my nephew was born my brother said he had to sleep on the floor some nights because he _breathed_ too loudly.”

"Really?" he asked, not allowing himself to hope just yet, but letting the comfort of his surroundings seep back in. He took a sip of the tea and it washed some of the bitterness out of his mouth.

“Yup. And they went and had two more after that, so it all must’ve worked out somehow, right?”

“Hm.” They sat in companionable silence for a while, and when his worst thoughts had quieted themselves enough, William offered to help Yousef continue whatever he’d been doing before he’d dropped in. This turned out to be washing, peeling, and chopping a ludicrous amount of vegetables, so many in fact that he’d nearly lost himself in the easy rhythm of it by the time his phone buzzed.

William barely washed his hands before lunging to answer, but all he heard was Sana’s curt “You can come back now” before the line went dead again. He looked at Yousef, who gave him a hopeful thumbs up.

“All good?”

“I guess we’ll see.” William put his phone in his pocket and suddenly felt awkward again. His hardwired instinct was to pretend his embarrassing show of vulnerability, short as it had been, had never happened. If he’d been so weak in front of his father or brother they surely would have been either disgusted or delighted to exploit it. But in the face of Yousef’s unwavering kindness, he couldn’t imagine him using it against him. So instead he swallowed his discomfort, looked him in the eye, and said, “Thank you.”

Yousef waved him off. “Anytime! Who knows, it might be me calling you in a few years,” he said with a laugh.

“I’ll keep some tea in the house,” William promised gravely, and then he was shooed out.

Noora was sitting on the steps of their apartment, and he was immediately reminded of when their positions had been reversed so many months ago. It brought an inexplicable smile to his face, which only grew when she caught sight of him and started to stand up. He jogged over before Sana had fully gotten her on her feet and accepted the arms she threw around his neck.

“‘M sorry,” she snuffled into his chest. “You’ve been so good. This whole time all you’ve been is nice to me and I just keep throwing it back in your face.”

“It’s okay,” he said, half-muffled by her hair. “I know I’m overbearing sometimes. I just don’t want you to feel like you’re in this alone. If you need more space I can-”

Her hands tightened on the back of his shirt and she shook her head. “You're _not_ , I _don’t_. I don’t need space,” she said. Then, so quietly only he could hear, “Please don’t go.”

Relief washed over him, so strong his knees nearly buckled. “I’m not going anywhere,” he murmured, stroking circles down her back. “But I can still give you time to yourself, if that’s what you want.”

She pulled back and wiped her face with the sleeve of her shirt. “I just feel so useless right now,” she said, and her lower lip wobbled dangerously. “I can’t even pour cereal!”

He took her firmly by the shoulders. “Noora Saerte. You are the strongest, most capable person I know. If you never pour another bowl of cereal for yourself for the rest of your life that will still be true. Okay?”

She took a steadying breath and nodded. “Okay.” 

“Now. Can I please come back upstairs and live with you?”

“Yes,” she laughed. She was red-eyed, still in her pajamas with her hair falling out of its bun, and so devastatingly beautiful that he couldn’t help but tip forward and kiss her.

He was so thoroughly absorbed in this activity that he started violently when Sana said, extremely close to his ear, “Alright, I’ll see you at your next crisis.” 

When he and Noora pulled themselves back together she gave them a flippant wave. Noora reached out and caught her hand to squeeze it.

“Thank you Sana.”

“That’s what friends are for.” Sana looked at them, (the _both_ of them, he realized with a strange swelling sort of feeling in his throat) and smiled. 

\--

"Hi Linn!"

Noora watched Eskild's face light up as he answered his phone. "Is she better?" she asked, struggling to sit up in the oversized salon chair. His smile fell into a grimace, presumably at what Linn was saying, and he shook his head.

Noora clucked sympathetically. This afternoon's outing was supposed to be for the three of them, but Linn hadn't been feeling well enough to go out that morning. However, she and Eskild were adamant that they go on with brunch and pedicures without her, insisting that Noora deserved to be pampered. Noora had laughed, saying that it made no difference to her considering that it had been well over a month since she'd even seen her feet. But it was a comfortingly familiar activity for them, and one she probably wouldn't have so much time for in the future. At times it felt as if this pregnancy was dragging on forever, and at others it was flying by. She had to keep reminding herself to savour all the little moments that she might not get so easily in the next few years. Late nights out with the girls. Lazy mornings with William. And impromptu meals and shopping and spa days with Linn and Eskild, like this one. 

Unfortunately it looked like this particular day would be taking an unexpected turn.

"Okay, okay. We'll get some ginger ale and saltines on the way back. Yup. Don't worry about it. Go back to bed, okay?" Eskild hung up and sighed. “I’m sorry, do you mind if we switch from shopping to a movie at the flat?”

“Not at all! That way I still get to see both of you.” And truth be told, an afternoon on the couch sounded more appealing to Noora than walking from place to place buying things she didn’t need. 

They finished up their session at the salon and after a quick stop at the market for Linn’s sick provisions, made their way back to the kollektivet. Before they reached the stairs Eskild transferred the groceries to one arm and held the other out for Noora to hold.

She huffed, equal parts embarrassed and endeared. “Eskild, you don’t have to-”

“Of course I do! What kind of co-godfather would I be if I started shirking my duties now?”

She bit down a grin at the self-appointed title, and as they started the climb, she discovered she very much appreciated the extra help up. By the time they’d reached the landing she was completely winded.

“Take your time,” Eskild said, sitting her down on the little combination bench and shoe rack by the door that he had pointedly installed after Isak had tracked dirt one too many times into the entryway.

“Co-godfather, huh?” she asked, still catching her breath. “So you and Chris finally came to an agreement?”

“Mm.” Eskild nodded, but pursed his lips in a way that meant he still thought he was the superior choice. “I thought we should compromise. Set a good example for our newest family member.”

 _Our family_ , she thought, and the smile he gave her was so soft and warm that tears welled up in her eyes almost instantly. 

“Hey, no- stop that!” His panicked expression made her laugh, but it came out as a hiccupy sob.

“I’m sorry, it’s the hormones,” she sniffled. “Just give me a minute.”

A few deep breaths and a fistful of tissues later, she let Eskild haul her back up onto her feet and into a slightly awkward hug.

“Can’t wait for this baby to be out so I can squeeze you properly again,” he grumbled into her hair.

“Me neither.” 

Finally they pulled back and he grinned. “Okay, ready?”

Noora blinked, suddenly wary. There was something about the sparkle in his eye that promised some sort of mischief was afoot, but she knew from experience that whatever it was was probably unavoidable. “Sure.”

He unlocked the door and steered her in, hands on her shoulders. “Linn?” he called loudly. “We’re home!”

The lights were off in the living room, which wasn’t unusual if Linn was home alone, but the utter stillness in the air was, as if a dozen people were holding their breath.

Eskild flipped the switch, and the cries of “SURPRISE!” nearly knocked her off her feet. Luckily Eskild still had a hold on her. With the lights on she could see that there were balloons and crepe paper decorations and people everywhere. 

Linn, looking not sick at all, shouted from the middle of the room, “I know you said you didn’t need a baby shower but we all wanted to do something, so here’s your “You’re having a baby and we love you and want to give you stuff you might need for that” party.”

Noora looked around at all the beaming faces- Eva, Vilde, Chris, Sana, Elias and his friends, Isak and the boys, Chris and William- and promptly burst into tears.

“She’s fine, it’s the hormones!” Eskild called out.

Before she knew what was happening she was being hugged by Linn and Eskild, followed by the girls, then everyone was a mass of limbs. Noora clung onto whatever arm was wrapped around her and laughed through her tears. 

Eventually everyone settled down enough to lead Noora to the chair in front of the coffee table, which was piled high with gifts for her and William to open. He sat down beside her and kissed her temple. As Linn and Eskild squabbled over which gift should be opened first, William took her hand. 

“Okay?” he asked, eyes searching and hopeful. Noora smiled and squeezed his fingers.

“Never better.”

\--

If you asked Chris who his best friend in the world was, he wouldn’t hesitate to answer: William. No contest. They were practically brothers. He’d do any favor, indulge any request, commit any number of crimes for him and all he had to do was ask. Which was why, when William called him at ass o’clock on his day off, he had picked up the phone. It was also why, when he’d explained that he had some bullshit half-day teambuilding session for his shiny new lawyer job that he couldn’t skip, Chris had agreed to babysit (“do _not_ call it that,” William had warned him severely) his best friend’s very pregnant, very irritable wife. 

The only problem with this plan was that although Chris had agreed to it, Noora had not, so he was left with the unenviable task of convincing her to let him into the apartment.

“Just for a few hours,” he pleaded.

He watched her face darken and braced himself for a storm. At eight and a half months pregnant he would have thought she’d be all mellow and sleepy and...glowy? That was what people said about pregnant ladies, right? They glowed for some reason? But from what he could tell, Noora was her usual intense, terrifying self, only bigger and with an even lower tolerance for bullshit (if that was possible).

She had opened her mouth, presumably to give a scathing refusal, but he’d rushed on before she could get a word out. “I know you don’t need it. It’s for William. He said he’ll feel better knowing someone is here with you in case of...anything.”

Chris tried not to think too hard about what “anything” entailed, because if he did he might realize how profoundly unqualified he was to handle any of the anythings that would plausibly come up.

Noora’s expression shifted from enraged to skeptical to resigned in the span of a few seconds.

“I hope you like laundry and reality TV,” was all she said before turning around, “because that’s what I had planned for today.”

Chris held in a sigh of relief. The hard part was over; now all he had to do was hang around until William got back, and with any luck he’d still have time to meet Eva for lunch at her office like he’d originally planned. His day would be back on track in no time.

-

It was only one and a half episodes into _Married at First Sight_ when Chris suspected that his day would not, in fact, be back on track in no time. It happened a few times before he caught on, but it seemed like every fifteen minutes or so Noora twitched and let out a sharp breath. 

“Uh, Noora?” he asked after a few more rounds of this, when she clenched the T-shirt she’d been folding between her fingers so hard that it started to rip.

“What?” she snapped.

“Are you like...y’know?” 

She shook her head vehemently. “Nope! Absolutely not. I am not in labor. These are Braxton Hicks. False contractions,” she clarified when he looked at her blankly.

“Are those supposed to hurt? These look like they hurt.”

“I’m fine!” She tossed the shirt aside and bared her teeth at him in what was probably an attempt at a smile while taking deep breaths. After a few endless seconds the pain seemed to drain out of her, and she leaned back on the couch more comfortably. “See? All good.” 

Chris bit his tongue to keep from arguing with her. After all, Noora knew way more about this stuff than he did, and anyway, William would be back in the afternoon, only- he checked the clock- three hours? Nothing too crazy could happen between now and then, right?

They settled in and watched some more TV, until ten minutes later when Noora let out a sharp gasp.

“Okay seriously, I’m calling W-”

“Do not call him!” she shouted. “We can wait!”

“I really don’t think we can!” Chris startled himself at how high his voice had gotten.

“I can. He’ll be done soon, and we’ll go to the hospital together.”

“Oh my God.”

And so it went, with Noora staunchly denying the obvious contractions and Chris’s sanity unraveling with every wince and shift.

“Stop pacing,” she said without looking up from the socks she was pairing. “You’re stressing me out.”

“ _I’m_ stressing _you_ out?!” Chris raked a hand through his already-destroyed hair. “If contractions are four minutes apart we have to go to the hospital and you had three in the last-” he glanced at his phone’s stopwatch that he’d been checking in between frantic Googling- “fourteen minutes! So either we go _right now_ or I'm gonna have to explain to William why his baby was born in your bathtub, which won’t be ideal for any of us!" 

Noora glared at him from her place on the couch, unmoved, before another contraction hit. She tensed and cried out so shrilly that it made Chris weak in the knees. 

It was then that he decided that the time for things like pride and dignity was long past. He'd have to resort to begging. Slowly, as if he were approaching a tiger, he sat beside Noora and offered a hand, which she squeezed so tightly he felt the bones creak. He waited for her breath to even out and squeezed back.

“Noora, _please_ let me call William. He’ll kill me if anything happens to you guys."

To his utter horror, Noora’s lip began to tremble and tears sprang up in her eyes. She buried her face in Chris’s neck and clung to his shirt, and it was all he could do not to start crying along with her. 

"This is all wrong," she sobbed. "He should be here. It’s not time, it’s too early. I’m not ready!" 

_Me neither_ , he thought but wisely did not say. Oh well. One of them would have to pretend to know what they were doing, and Noora had clearly tapped out. Lucky for her, she was currently in the presence of a grade-A bullshitter.

“Hey,” he said, running a careful hand down her back. “Not ready? Have you met yourself? Have you met _William_? You guys are better than ready, you can improvise. That’s way more important. Do you know anyone else who can plan a wedding in two months?”

“No,” she said with a big, mucusy sniffle. He tried not to shudder and pressed on.

“Besides, you guys are like, annoyingly good at taking care of people. I can’t go a week without checking in with William or he comes after me, and I know you do the same thing with all the girls. You think you’re gonna forget how to do it for your own kid?” He shook her shoulder gently and she made a wet sound that he hoped was a laugh.

“And even if you’re not ready, you know who is?” When Noora lifted her head to look at him he pointed to her belly. “Her. And I think she’s the one who has the final say in this, so why don’t we call William and meet him at the hospital so you guys can meet her together. Sound good?”

She nodded, releasing her white-knuckle grip on his shirt. “Yes.” 

“Oh thank God.” Chris leapt up and hit the call button on his phone, then set about hustling them out of the apartment. In that time his call to William went unanswered twice, and Noora suffered through another contraction. Needless to say, by the time they’d reached his car Chris’s nerves were thoroughly fried.

“D’you think you can sit up front? Or maybe you should lay d-”

A screech that ripped out of Noora that sounded more animal than human was the deciding factor in that dilemma.

“Backseat it is!” He wrenched the door open and tried not to get in the way as she crawled in, then sprinted around to the driver’s side. He realized with mounting dread that William had missed another call.

“What’s going on? Why isn’t he answering?” Noora choked out when the contraction subsided. 

Chris was wondering that himself, but he pushed aside the gnawing dread and threw a smile over his shoulder. “I’m sure he’ll call back, I’ll just text him and we’ll get going, okay?”

 **Chris:** BRO WTF ANSWER YOUR PHONE NOORA’S HAVING THE BABY  
NOT JOKING THIS IS NOT A DRILL  
MEET US AT THE HOSPITAL

“Okay!” he shouted in a voice that was cheerful and surely not unhinged. “Who’s ready to have a baby?”

“Christoffer, if you don’t start this fucking car-”

“Exactly right, let’s go!”

After twenty frantic minutes of driving, Chris thought he’d fully steeled himself to all the frightening sounds coming from his backseat. He had assumed that the abrupt shrieks, groans and screams were the worst he was going to hear, but in keeping with every assumption he’d made about today, he had been wrong.

The worst sound, the one that made his insides freeze up just as they were pulling up to the hospital entrance, was a sharp intake of breath from Noora and a soft, “Oh, _fuck_.”

He didn’t dare take his eyes off the road. “What?” he asked, voice cracking.

There was an agonizing moment of silence before Noora took another shaky breath and whispered, “I think my water just broke.”

If anyone had asked Chris how he made it from the middle of midday traffic to the entrance of the hospital he couldn’t have given any coherent sort of answer. The important thing was that he did, with his car (backseat upholstery notwithstanding) and everyone in it intact. From there it was a straight shot to the front desk and an unsurprisingly speedy check-in, and soon Noora was set up in her own room surrounded by a flock of nurses. Still no word from William.

He endured another half-hour of screams and bone-crushing hand-holds before William came tearing into the room, looking as harried as Chris felt.

“Where have you been?!” Chris and Noora shouted at the same time. It was hard to say who was closer to tears.

“They took all our phones until the lunch break, fucking assholes. Are you okay? Everything’s okay?” He crowded up close to Noora, brushing hair off her sweaty forehead. He probably would have climbed into bed with her if it had been at all possible.

Noora gulped in a breath and nodded, and William sagged halfway onto the bed with relief. He laced his fingers through hers just in time for her to crush his hand through a contraction. Chris tried not to enjoy it too much.

“So,” said a bemused nurse, “if he’s the father, you are…?”

“Seriously considering a vasectomy. Good luck buddy!” He waved to the couple, who thoroughly ignored him, and fled. 

-

When he was younger, William had thought that maybe it was normal for his father to be as distant as he was, or that it was something he’d been doing wrong. He’d always assumed that some day he would either work hard enough to earn the approval and affection that he’d wanted so desperately, or he would become so self-sufficient that he would no longer need it.

But now, looking down at the impossibly tiny baby nestled in the crook of his arm, almost completely covered by a blanket and hat, face red and squishy and scrunched up with sleep, he had no room for any other feeling but incandescent joy. His heart was nearly bursting with the enormity of it, and he knew, with a bone-deep certainty, that there was nothing in the world that she could do or be that would ever make him feel differently. 

He brought her up so he could murmur in her ear, softly but fierce with conviction, “We’re so happy you’re here. We can’t wait to watch you grow. We’ll be there with you every step of the way. We loved you the moment we knew you were coming, and we always will.”

-

Noora woke slowly, drifting along on fading painkillers and not completely sure if she was still dreaming or not. She could see William and the baby, just out of reach and fuzzy around the edges, but there was no sense of urgency in the realization. He was swaying gently from side to side as he held her close. Her head fit in the palm of his hand, she noticed with quiet delight. He was saying something to her, but she felt no need to interrupt, so she watched them together until he glanced back at her and saw that she was awake. His eyes, shining with unshed tears, crinkled at the corners as he mouthed, _Hi_.

“Hi,” she whispered back hoarsely. She supposed that made sense. The patch of sky she could see through the window was only just starting to streak with pinks and oranges. It hadn’t been more than a few hours since she’d been screaming her lungs out, though that experience already felt like years ago. They were in an entirely new chapter, now.

He moved closer, easing into the chair beside her bed so that she could be level with the bundle in his arms. “Everyone’s here,” he said. With a quirk of his lips, “Eskild has them corralled in a waiting room.”

Noora bit her lip as she propped herself up on her elbows, scooting back until she was sitting up against the pillows. “Five more minutes?”

He nodded, and she knew he must be feeling what she was feeling. There was a sublime sort of quality to this moment. Like they were living in a soap bubble, perfect and beautiful and theirs. Let it be just the three of them for a little bit longer, before they let the outside world in. She reached out and he gently transferred the baby into her arms, then let his head rest on her shoulder. Noora didn’t know how long they spent just gazing into her perfect sleeping face, but after some time the baby let out the barest breath of a yawn, and the spell was broken.

“Silije,” Noora crooned. “Are you ready to meet everyone? I think we’ve kept them waiting long enough.”

And so she sat up, grimy, tired and sore, her daughter secure in her arms, and smiled harder than she ever had in her life as William opened the door and the rest of their strange, wonderful, and wholly unexpected family flooded into the room.

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea how a throwaway gag from my first fic turned into a 10k fic for a pairing I don't usually ship but here we are! This has been languishing in my WIP files 80% done for well over a year so I'm just thrilled to have finished it, much less have someone read it. If you made it this far thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
